Thousand people killed every year on J&K roads, Govt must take steps to curb accidents

Last updated May 7, 2015

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Despite several fatal accidents on the hilly roads in Jammu and Kashmir the state government as well as traffic department has not done anything significant to prevent the loss of life. In fact the authorities have shown little concern or responsibility in handling the road accidents which happen in routine, and maximum the government does is to announce few lakhs as compensation to the family of deceased. The money may be paid but what about wasting of precious lives as many of the dead are sole bread earners of their families, and their loss leads to complete ruin for many. There is a huge transport department in J&K, there are numerous traffic officials, and personnel who are employed to ensure safe roads, prevention of accidents, stopping rash driving, checking overloading, maintaining the roads, and to ensure drunk, and dangerous driving is curbed. The poor condition of road infrastructure in hilly areas is also a reason for the multiple accidents but no effort has been taken by the state government to take action against a moribund bureaucracy which prefers to sit in Srinagar and Jammu, and at district offices but does nothing to alleviate the sufferings of the people.

Thousands of crores are being spent in hiring, and maintain the large force of officials which is expected to serve the people but instead of performing their jobs, the men in the government behave like overlords of the imperial days, and treat citizens as their subjects. The problem is further complicated because the aam janta still treats them with reverence, and this helps the officials to take advantage of the situation. Governments may have changed across the country including J&K but the working of the state, and administration remains the same. It was a non-performer under NC-Cong regime, and it serves only it’s political masters and their constituencies like they did in the past.

It is shocking but true that more than one thousand people get killed, and several times more get injured in road accidents every year but no efforts have been made to curb these accidents. No planning, operation and maintenance agency has studied the reasons for the repeated accidents which happen in particular areas to ensure that this waste of human lives does not happen. The state government must take cognizance of these incidents at the earliest, and ensure that road infrastructure, traffic management and safety, vehicle safety, more traffic police are made available on the ground. If this does not happen soon more people will lose their lives on state roads, and they will hold no one but the government responsible for this failure.